Tobago’s tourism/Carnival funding cut for 2027

Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Gov­ern­ment’s al­lo­ca­tion for the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly’s (THA) Tourism and Hos­pi­tal­i­ty Sec­tor sup­port pro­gramme has been re­duced by 80 per cent for 2027, while sev­er­al tourism-re­lat­ed en­ti­ties linked to To­ba­go Car­ni­val have al­so re­ceived low­er al­lo­ca­tions.

How­ev­er, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dave Tan­coo yes­ter­day as­sured Par­lia­ment that or­gan­i­sa­tions in­volved in To­ba­go Car­ni­val would con­tin­ue to re­ceive ad­e­quate fund­ing.

Tan­coo ad­dressed con­cerns dur­ing Thurs­day’s Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee meet­ing as Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) MPs Hans Des Vi­gnes, Colm Im­bert, Pen­ne­lope Beck­les, Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly, Stu­art Young and Mar­vin Gon­za­les scru­ti­nised the THA’s pro­posed $2.738 bil­lion ex­pen­di­ture pack­age for 2027.

De­bate fo­cused heav­i­ly on al­lo­ca­tions for tourism, cul­ture and eco­nom­ic de­vel­op­ment, with sev­er­al ex­changes be­tween Tan­coo, for­mer fi­nance min­is­ter Im­bert and Gads­by-Dol­ly be­com­ing heat­ed.

Im­bert ques­tioned the re­duc­tion in tourism and hos­pi­tal­i­ty sec­tor sup­port fund­ing, which fell from $5 mil­lion in 2026 to $1 mil­lion in 2027.

“It is a crit­i­cal area of sup­port in To­ba­go, which is a tourism econ­o­my,” Im­bert said.

Tan­coo replied that the pro­gramme had re­ceived a larg­er al­lo­ca­tion in 2026 to fa­cil­i­tate spe­cif­ic ini­tia­tives that had al­ready been im­ple­ment­ed.

When Im­bert again pressed for an ex­pla­na­tion, Tan­coo ac­cused him of seek­ing a “sound­bite.”

“You can’t ex­pect that the same pay­ment made in 2026 will be made again in 2027, when those ini­tia­tives have al­ready been pro­vid­ed for,” Tan­coo said, adding that it was mis­lead­ing to char­ac­terise the change as a dras­tic cut that would cre­ate a cri­sis.

Im­bert main­tained that the re­duc­tion would be viewed as an 80 per cent cut by stake­hold­ers.

“Do you think that tourism and hos­pi­tal­i­ty sec­tor sup­port in To­ba­go de­serves an 80 per cent cut in 2027?” he asked.

Tan­coo re­spond­ed, “Asked and an­swered. I want to be very care­ful with the spin you’re try­ing to cre­ate. Monies in 2026 were ex­pend­ed and new ini­tia­tives will oc­cur in 2027.

“This Gov­ern­ment has al­ready spent $5 mil­lion with the THA’s help in iden­ti­fy­ing ini­tia­tives un­der the Tourism and Hos­pi­tal­i­ty Sec­tor sup­port pro­gramme, and $1 mil­lion has been al­lo­cat­ed for 2027.”

Des Vi­gnes al­so ques­tioned a re­duc­tion in fund­ing for the To­ba­go Tourism Agency Ltd, not­ing that its re­vised 2026 al­lo­ca­tion was $50 mil­lion com­pared with $40 mil­lion for 2027.

Tan­coo con­firmed the fig­ures but said he could not im­me­di­ate­ly ex­plain the de­crease.

The min­is­ter al­so dis­put­ed Des Vi­gnes’ de­scrip­tion of a fund­ing “cut” for the To­ba­go Fes­ti­vals Com­mis­sion Ltd (TF­CL), which re­ceived $39 mil­lion in 2026 and will re­ceive $37 mil­lion in 2027.

Des Vi­gnes ar­gued that TF­CL was re­spon­si­ble for re­cur­ring events such as To­ba­go Car­ni­val and that the re­duc­tion rep­re­sent­ed a cut re­gard­less of how it was char­ac­terised.

Tan­coo said the high­er 2026 al­lo­ca­tion re­flect­ed li­a­bil­i­ties that had to be set­tled that year and were no longer a fac­tor in 2027.

“I as­sure the view­ing and lis­ten­ing au­di­ence, es­pe­cial­ly in To­ba­go, that the TF­CL and To­ba­go’s fes­ti­vals are be­ing ad­e­quate­ly fund­ed through the THA and its part­ner­ship with the Gov­ern­ment,” he said.

Oth­er re­duc­tions high­light­ed dur­ing the de­bate in­clud­ed a $1 mil­lion de­crease for the To­ba­go Hos­pi­tal­i­ty and Tourism In­sti­tute and a $1 mil­lion re­duc­tion for the To­ba­go Per­form­ing Arts Com­pa­ny.

Des Vi­gnes al­so point­ed to low­er al­lo­ca­tions for cul­tur­al groups and Na­tion­al Days and Fes­ti­vals ac­tiv­i­ties.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Tan­coo al­so said the THA’s rent and lease al­lo­ca­tion was be­ing in­creased by $2.6 mil­lion be­cause the Leg­is­la­ture’s build­ings re­quire ex­ten­sive elec­tri­cal, plumb­ing and struc­tur­al up­grades.

As a re­sult, al­ter­na­tive ac­com­mo­da­tion will be need­ed for staff and As­sem­bly sit­tings while re­pairs are car­ried out.

“A suit­able build­ing is cur­rent­ly be­ing sourced and a new land­lord will be sought for 2027. The pro­cure­ment process is now start­ing,” he said.

The min­is­ter al­so re­vealed that fund­ing for the Food Box Pro­gramme had been re­duced be­cause the ini­tia­tive did not func­tion ef­fec­tive­ly in 2026 and is un­der re­view.

At the same time, he con­firmed in­creased fund­ing re­quests for To­ba­go’s School Feed­ing Pro­gramme.

Tan­coo said costs as­so­ci­at­ed with the 2024 To­ba­go oil spill con­tin­ue to af­fect the As­sem­bly, with bills still be­ing re­ceived. He al­so con­firmed in­creased fund­ing for con­tract po­si­tions and short-term em­ploy­ment pro­grammes.

The pro­ceed­ings were marked by sev­er­al sharp ex­changes be­tween Gov­ern­ment and Op­po­si­tion MPs.

Dur­ing one dis­agree­ment over fig­ures, Gads­by-Dol­ly told Tan­coo, “Min­is­ter, your ac­count­ing is as cre­ative as your lan­guage.”

Tan­coo and Im­bert al­so ac­cused each oth­er of be­ing “mis­chie­vous” and “ridicu­lous” re­spec­tive­ly, while Tan­coo sug­gest­ed the Op­po­si­tion had de­vel­oped a “new-found love for To­ba­go.”

On trav­el ex­pen­di­ture, Tan­coo said the ac­tu­al amount spent by the THA in 2026 was ap­prox­i­mate­ly $1.6 mil­lion, de­spite a $1 mil­lion re­duc­tion in the 2027 al­lo­ca­tion.

He sug­gest­ed the change may re­flect con­fer­ences and events held in 2026 that are not ex­pect­ed to take place next year.